The tale of Miner Willy and his incredible adventures in the mines, and then the mansions, of Surbiton is legend. But like all legends, it doesn’t tell the whole story.

Most people know Willy simply as a digger who got lucky and lived happily ever after in decadent luxury. Far fewer know the secret – suppressed for quarter of a century by the government – of how he also saved Planet Earth from alien invasion.

It wasn’t until an eccentric but dedicated historian writing a paper for a renowned academic journal (Retro Gamer issue 63) pieced together the complete saga of Willy’s heroic exploits from fragments of scattered evidence – in the form of obscure retellings of the ‘Manic Miner’ folk fable in ancient languages readable only via long-obsolete machines – that the whole truth was finally revealed.